Calgary Introduces New Control Laws On Medical Marijuana Businesses

In a new move that is meant to regulate the medical marijuana counseling businesses, the Calgary City Council has set new rules that will see the number of the counseling businesses limited in certain locations. The businesses will now be required to apply for development permits from the Calgary city authorities for licenses of operations.

The new rules passed by a 10-3 vote by the Calgary council stipulate that the counseling medical marijuana firms must not be located within 300 meters from a similar business and they should be at least 150 meters away from learning institutions.

Provisions of the new rules have also directed the city marijuana authorities to develop rules that will categorize medical marijuana counseling as a distinct business. The new rules also provide for management of the counseling business, as well as ensuring that they were separated away from the schools in the area.

The city’s planning commission presented their amendments on the proposed bylaws that will see the council clearly distinguish between counseling centers and medical clinics in the city.

According to the Calgary planning report, the law does not allow the sale of medical marijuana on a retail basis and therefore, people who were not medical personnel are not catered to in the new legislations. The report further added that they intend to provide a clear definition on the scope of medical marijuana clinics and the counseling services offered in the state.

Mayor Naheed Nenshi disagreed with Evans Woolley, with the former arguing that Calgary was obliged to ensure that the laws guiding medical marijuana business were clear rather than taking years of developing laws as it was being argued by Councillor Evans Woolley.

Mayor Nenshi further stated that upon discussion with mayors of other cities on the issue of medical marijuana counseling businesses, many of the mayors were of the opinion that they had left a legal vacuum on these businesses, as some of them had started operating as dispensaries despite the fact that they were not medical practitioners.

Administrators were quick to state that with the imminent full marijuana legalization by the Federal government, they were pessimistic that the demand for the new classification would remain significantly low.

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